Arts fest has new riverfront canvas

Thursday

May 31, 2012 at 12:01 AMMay 31, 2012 at 1:14 PM

In returning to the Scioto riverfront this weekend, the Columbus Arts Festival might as well be moving to a new venue. The Scioto Mile was only a blueprint in 2007, the last year the event took place on the river before moving to the Discovery District during construction.

Amy Saunders, The Columbus Dispatch

In returning to the Scioto riverfront this weekend, the Columbus Arts Festival might as well be moving to a new venue.

The Scioto Mile was only a blueprint in 2007, the last year the event took place on the river before moving to the Discovery District during construction.

Now, artist booths will stretch down revamped, tree-lined streets and across new bridges on Main and Rich streets. Musicians will perform in a new pavilion at Bicentennial Park, overlooking fountains where children can play.

"Yes, we're going back to our old location, but it's a whole new world down there," said Scott Huntley, first-year director of the festival, which will begin Friday and continue through Sunday.

"The venue is just incredible."

Since opening almost 11 months ago, the Scioto Mile has hosted concerts, movie screenings and children's activities. But for those who know the area only in passing from the highway, the festival might offer the first major reason to stop for a visit, said Dan Williamson, spokesman for Columbus Mayor Michael B. Coleman.

Between the Scioto Mile and the equally new Columbus Commons, festival attendees who haven't visited Downtown in a while will notice heightened activity.

"We're really seeing the transformation of Downtown," Williamson said. "It's going to bring so much activity on both sides of the river."

The arts festival played out the past four years on the streets of the Discovery District, near the Columbus College of Art & Design and the Columbus Museum of Art.

Though always planned as a temporary host, the neighborhood benefited from exposure to new visitors, CCAD President Denny Griffith said.

"Having the arts festival here ... certainly brought exceptional vitality and energy to these streets for a few days," he said.

"We dreamed, 'Gee whiz, maybe it would stick.'??"

But Anne London is among the exhibiting artists who disliked the venue, saying the crowded streets made the festival feel more like a carnival than a high-end juried art show. Sales of her endangered-species drawings, she said, were stronger at the riverfront than in the Discovery District.

For Terri Hess, a longtime festival patron, the temporary venue - with its tight setup - compelled her to rush through the offerings rather than peruse them at her own pace.

"On the riverfront, you've got people enjoying the grass areas and the shade of the trees and listening to music," said Hess, 53, of Westerville. "It's one of my favorite things in Columbus all year."

Huntley said that visitors can better navigate the riverfront site, which offers four entrances and more parking options. Given the festival's circular layout, he said, attendees won't as easily overlook portions of the fair or have to retrace their steps.

"No matter where you are in the festival, you can look and see the entire festival."

Location is a key factor for artists selling their work, said Chris Coffey, a photographer from Akron who has exhibited in Columbus since 1996.

"You've got five seconds of fleeting eye contact when they walk by your booth," he said. "If you're tucked in a bad corner somewhere or the traffic flow isn't open enough, they may walk by."

In future years, Huntley would like to see the festival add more theatrical performances on its three stages and perhaps grow to encompass performances at Columbus Commons.

For now, organizers are focusing on the move, after having introduced new ventures last year that included a showcase of Columbus-area artists and live art demonstrations.

For London, the riverfront location was reason enough to return to the festival after moving from Hilliard to Louisiana. Even when she lived in San Francisco, the artist made a point of driving cross-country to exhibit her work here.

"Artists have these criteria: Am I going to meet my clientele, is the weather going to hold up - who knows?" she said.

"The one thing you can at least count on is location."

asaunders@dispatch.com

@amyksaunders

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